I have been repeatedly asked in recent months “What Difference Does an Election Make”? I strongly believe that this significant watershed mid-term election could provide the ignition the market needs to get back to the 12,000 level. Here are a few bullet points which help to illustrate my thoughts:

· Over the last 60 plus years the market has never declined in the 2 quarters following mid-term elections, with the average market gain being over 18% – that makes Dow 12,500 possible next year.

· A generational event has taken place! Deficits and debt have outraged the public and they demand CHANGE! This deeply concerned public has roared. Washington will see new faces and new ideas. We will find our way back to fiscal responsibility. We need a new tax structure which is fair, easy & predictable. Maybe it is time

Confronting the federal deficit starts with grasping just how colossal that number actually is. So, what would $1 trillion get you?

The figure is almost incomprehensible: $1,000,000,000,000. One trillion dollars. That’s a dozen zeros.

The Congressional Budget Office reports that during the first nine months of fiscal 2010 — which ends September 30 — the federal government spent $1 trillion more than it took in. That’s another $1 trillion added to a total national debt that stood at just over $13 trillion as of the Fourth of July. (On the bright side, the trillion-dollar nine-month deficit was about $80 billion less red ink than flowed during the same period last year.)

Not so long ago, the idea of a “trillion” anything was so farfetched that it evoked a comic response similar to what the use of the word “gazillion” does today. The 1960s More >

Sitting on the fence, waiting for the turn in macro economic indicators will disappoint and leave opportunity on the table. Rising correlations show investors are ignoring relative values among industries and assets, rather reacting to day-to-day signals on the economy. It is more likely that deflation and low growth will be the environment into the second half of the year, underscoring the need to diversify assets from a traditional long equity and bond portfolio.

Opportunities exist in right sized industries and companies and across asset classes. For companies that downsized, the benefits of incremental sales falling to the bottom line EPS have been borne out in Q2:10 earnings results. Indeed, the S&P 500 has rebounded 7.8% since July 2 despite weak economic data as corporate earnings have been stronger than analysts estimated on marginally higher revenues. With 53.4% of the S&P 500

When “Protect & Preserve” becomes “Preserve to Survive”

CoreStates’ Investment Management Process

The foundation of CoreStates’ investment management process is broad diversification – among the multitude of financial and real assets from domestic and foreign issuers, each of which may be owned on a long or a short basis, and managed with traditional or alternative investment strategies.

But, broad diversification is just the beginning. We follow that with effective portfolio construction – setting target allocations among the many asset classes and investment styles that, based their history and reasonable expectations for the future, should temper investment risk and thereby protect our clients’ current lifestyles.

After the target allocations are established, we implement them with prudent asset selection – seeking stocks, bonds, other financial and “hard” assets, as well as managed accounts, that accurately represent their asset class or style and More >

At CoreStates, a foundational belief is in the unpredictability of the future. Few would argue with this simple truth. Yet, few in the financial services industry honor this fact in the design of their services to clients. Most, in fact, tout their ability to predict the future as a key reason to entrust your assets to their supervision and management (and fees).

At the current time – three-quarters of the way through 2009 – we would ask these companies and their clients, “So, how is this working out for you?”
Many, we suspect, would lament the fact that they became net sellers of stocks during the first quarter decline to the March lows, then stood by as stocks gained 15% to 30% through the second quarter and repeated that performance in the third quarter.Now, as the fourth quarter begins and they still struggle